During First Friday Mass on Oct. 2, Bishop Robert Gruss encouraged Catholics to recognize the personal care of God and place greater trust in him, reflecting on the Church’s teaching about guardian angels.
The Mass was celebrated on the Feast of the Guardian Angels, which Bishop Gruss said reminds Catholics that God’s care for his people is not distant or impersonal.
“God’s care for us is not vague or distant,” Bishop Gruss said. “In fact, it is very personal. Very personal.”
“So personal that he entrusts each of us to the care of an angel,” he said.
Bishop Gruss pointed to the first reading from Exodus, in which God tells his people, “See, I am sending an angel before you” to guard them on their journey and bring them to the place he has prepared.
God knew his people would face challenges, temptations and dangers, Bishop Gruss said. Rather than simply giving them directions and leaving them on their own, God sent an angel to accompany them.
“This is true for us,” he said.
Bishop Gruss cited the Catechism of the Catholic Church, which teaches that human life is surrounded by the watchful care and intercession of angels from its beginning until death.
“Beside every believer stands an angel, as protector and shepherd leading him to life,” Bishop Gruss said.
He also recalled Pope Benedict XVI’s description of angels as servants of God who walk at our side, protect us and defend us from danger.
“They are messengers of God’s love and they’re signs of his constant concern for you and for me,” Bishop Gruss said.
Learning to listen
While Catholics may not see their guardian angels, Bishop Gruss encouraged them to live with a childlike faith that recognizes their presence.
Guardian angels can enlighten people through their conscience, he said, helping them avoid sin and encouraging them toward love and service of God and neighbor.
“How real are they to you?” he asked.
Bishop Gruss acknowledged that he does not always give enough attention to his own guardian angel, although he has experienced moments when he felt protected.
“Perhaps I need to be a little more attentive to his daily presence,” he said.
He encouraged Catholics to grow in awareness of their guardian angels and trust that they are working behind the scenes, protecting them from evil and helping them keep their gaze directed toward God.
The homily also connected the feast of the Guardian Angels with Jesus’ teaching in the Gospel about becoming like children.
When the disciples asked who was greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven, Jesus placed a child in their midst. Bishop Gruss said the disciples were focused on status and importance, while Jesus pointed instead to humility, trust and dependence on God.
“Children know how to trust, don’t they?” Bishop Gruss said. “They know they need help. They know they can’t do everything for themselves.”
Adults, he said, can easily forget that lesson.
“We think we’re in control,” Bishop Gruss said. “We like to solve our own problems. We think, ‘I’m in charge, I can do this.’”
But the spiritual life begins when people recognize how much they need God.
“That’s where the spiritual life begins, in recognizing, acknowledging, and living in the reality of just how much I need God,” Bishop Gruss said.
A reminder of every person’s dignity
Bishop Gruss said the presence of guardian angels also points to the dignity of every human person.
Jesus’ command not to despise the “little ones,” he said, reminds Catholics that every person matters to God.
“Every person, every child, every elderly person, every poor person, every migrant, every refugee, every person who feels forgotten or overlooked, every person matters to God, and therefore should matter to us,” Bishop Gruss said.
“Why? Because each person is loved by God.”
Bishop Gruss connected that message to words spoken by Pope Leo XIV shortly after his election: “God loves us. God loves you all, and evil will not prevail.”
That message, Bishop Gruss said, captures the heart of the feast.
“God loves each one of us individually, and personally, and intimately,” he said.
Because God loves his people, he surrounds them with his protective care, Bishop Gruss said. Guardian angels serve as a daily reminder that evil, fear and loneliness do not have the final word.
“God’s love has the final word,” he said.
Bishop Gruss concluded by encouraging Catholics to thank God for the invisible but real companion given to them throughout their lives and to become more like the child in the Gospel — humble, trusting and confident in the Father’s love.
“For in the end, that’s the message, I believe, of today’s feast,” he said. “God loves you.”
“He walks with you in every moment,” Bishop Gruss said. “And we never, ever journey alone.”